


Drawing Houses

by flashindie



Category: Dollhouse
Genre: Canon, Gen, Implied Relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-10
Updated: 2013-02-10
Packaged: 2017-11-28 19:16:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/677944
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flashindie/pseuds/flashindie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes Echo thinks.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Drawing Houses

“I’m reading a book,” Sierra says, and she plays with her fork a little, pushes some of the mashed potato to the side of her plate. “It has pictures.”

Lunch today is steak and mashed potato, two pieces of broccoli, three carrot sticks and a sliced tomato. Today, its Echo’s favourite, just like yesterday the pancakes she had for breakfast were, and tomorrow the rice pudding will be. This is not unusual. Echo likes food. Enjoys it.

“One of the pictures is of a house,” Sierra says. “A man and a woman live there.”

Victor hasn’t stopped looking at Sierra since she sat down, and his gaze is so focused, like the way Doctor Saunders looks at her, at any of them. It makes Echo feel things sometimes. Trust. She trusts Boyd.

She thinks maybe she trusts Victor and Sierra too. They’re both nice people and they have lunch together every day. 

“Oh,” Victor says, and he’s still looking at Sierra, eyes big and wide, and he blinks, once, twice, three times. “I like pictures.” 

Sierra doesn’t reply, not in words, but she smiles. It’s pretty, Echo thinks. Sierra is pretty. 

“Me too,” Echo says, and she watches Sierra glance at her. Sierra has brown eyes. “I like pictures. I like drawing them too.”

“You’re a good drawer,” Victor agrees, and Echo smiles, says, “Thank you,” because it was a nice thing to say. 

“Drawing makes you better,” Sierra says, only it sounds more like a question in Echo’s ears, and she thinks for a minute, looks at where the gravy is making the potato brown. It looks unpleasant. 

“I don’t know,” Echo says finally. “Maybe. It makes me not broken.”

Sierra nods, like she understands and Echo feels relieved that she doesn’t have to explain it anymore. She doesn’t like explaining things. It makes her head hurt. 

“It’s important to be the best,” Sierra says, and she nods her head a little as she says it, and then she starts to say something else, but her mouth stops working and Echo wonders if Sierra is broken. She hopes not. She likes Sierra. They’re friends. They help each other to be the best they can be.

“It’s also important,” Sierra tries, and then she stops. Blinks. Victor’s still watching her, fingers splayed on his thighs, and his mouth partway open, like he thinks he can give Sierra the words she needs. He can’t, Echo knows. She’s tried to give someone else her words before. It never works. 

“It’s also important to not be broken,” Sierra says finally, and Victor nods. 

“I’m not broken anymore,” he declares. “I was fixed.”

Echo watches Sierra watch Victor. Sierra cries at night. Sierra disappears. Echo wonders if Sierra’s broken. Echo thinks that maybe they all are. Like they’re all a mix of pictures that somebody has ripped up with big hands, hands bigger than hers or Sierra’s or even Victor’s. Even Boyd’s. She looks down at her hands, and then up at the balcony, at where she knew Boyd would be watching her.

A strange look crosses his face as she glances at him. Boyd is different from them, Echo thinks. Boyd is not broken.

Sierra’s back to shifting mashed potato and Victor eats a slice of tomato. 

Sometimes, Echo thinks that --, sometimes she thinks—

Sometimes Echo _thinks_.


End file.
